Slip Slidin' Away
by itsgonnabemay5
Summary: Keith hurts himself ice skating. Lance, the cute ticket booth manager, takes him to the hospital.


Slip Slidin' Away

It was a typical Friday night at college, same as they always went. Pidge, Hunk, and Shiro were huddled together at Keith's apartment, wrapped up in a blanket on the couch as they watched some sort of TV movie, with Keith on the side of them, sitting alone in a chair.

They had all been friends since they met in college their freshman year. None of them lived together, but they often got together as friends. Because Keith's apartment was the cleanest and least occupied with roommates, they chose to get together at Keith's apartment more often than the others.

The night was early, but it had grown dark outside long before. Keith looked at his watch and groaned. He had a test tomorrow and he'd been putting it off all week. He had to take it Saturday or get a zero.

"Lame. I can't believe you made us watch this, Hunk!" Pidge said as she swatted a pillow at Hunk's face.

"Hey, it wasn't that bad," Hunk said. He stretched and yawned and pulled the blanket up to his chest.

"I'm with Pidge," Shiro said, and Hunk rolled his eyes and muttered a "whatever."

"Anyways, I hear the ice-skating rink downtown is open. What do you guys think?" Pidge said.

"Kinda chilly for that don't you think?" Hunk said.

"Hunk," Keith said. "I think that's kind of the point."

"I'm in," Shiro said. "I'm bored."

"I can't. I've got a test tomorrow I have to study for," Keith said.

"Aw, come on, Keith. Live a little. Come with us!" Pidge gave him a pleading look.

Keith sighed. "I don't know. I really should study."

"Are you sure, Keith?" Hunk said. The group of friends began putting on their coats in preparation for leaving the apartment.

"The test is tomorrow. I probably shouldn't." Keith watched his friends about to head out the door, and a part of him longed to go with them. He hated being the party pooper.

"We understand that you're busy," Shiro said. "But we'll miss you!"

They opened the door and a chilly breeze ran through the apartment. "Wait, guys! Maybe if we don't stay too long. . ."

Pidge smiled as she held the door open for Keith.

It was cold, very cold. Keith dug his hands deeper into his heavy coat, watching the many students skating gracefully in the outdoor rink. As they waited in line for their skates, Keith dug though his wallet and pulled out his debit card.

As they got closer, he could see the booth worker handing out tickets. He was young, a college student just like them. There seemed to be only one person working, hence the reason the line was moving slowly.

The closer they got to the front of the line, Keith had to keep himself from staring at the guy. He was slender, with a noticeably narrow, yet strong jaw. He always kept a smile on his face and laughed a lot. Keith picked up that he was a carefree, playful guy, just from the way he interacted with the customers.

The cute stranger had him temporarily making him forget that he was afraid of skating. Keith had only skated once in his life, and he was seven or eight at the time, so he hardly remembered it.

"And what size for you?"

Keith looked up to see him smiling at him. Keith cleared his throat. "Oh, uh, a nine."

He was handed his skates and then Keith paid for them and stepped aside while his friends did the same. Once he sat down, Keith realized he was given a size six instead, so he had to go back and exchange them.

Luckily, there was no line this time. "Hi." Keith noticed for the first time that the worker was wearing a name tag. "Um, Lance. I was mistakenly given the wrong size. I asked for a nine and got a six."

"Oh, my bad! I'm sorry!" Lance took the pair from Keith and gave him the correct pair this time.

"It's okay. Easy mistake," Keith said, and returned the smile as he left to go back to his friends.

His friends were already making their way down to the rink, so Keith quickly got into his skates and tied up the laces. Once he got his skates on, he carefully walked towards the rink. Taking in a deep breath, he stepped his right foot on the ice. "Ok, here goes."

He was forced forward to maintain his balance, and he put out his arms to steady himself. This was way harder than it looked.

Pidge skated by. "Hey, Keith!"

Keith turned and almost fell again.

"You gotta push your feet from side to side, one by one," she demonstrated.

It looked easy enough. Keith pushed out with his left foot and then with his right, and he was slowly sailing along. It was exhilarating, yet terrifying at the same time. He reached out and grabbed onto the bar on the side of the rink to stop himself.

Pidge laughed as she zoomed past him.

 _Left, right, left, right_ , Keith thought as he glided faster little by little, always staying close to the bar in case he lost his footing. After a while, he started getting the hang of it. When he felt like he was about to fall, he quickly grabbed the bar to slow him down.

Looking out around him, there were a few others doing the same as him, but he realized that by hovering the side, he wasn't experiencing the full effect of skating, of seeing the sights around him.

In the event of looking like a wuss, Keith decided he needed to ditch the bar and venture out with the rest of the skaters. He let go and pointed his body in the direction of the middle of the rink.

 _Push off,_ he ordered himself. He steadily made his way out, one foot at a time until he was headed near Shiro, who was skating around like he'd been doing it his whole life. Keith slowly but surely found his way to him, arms out to keep his balance.

He saw Shiro look up and immediately grinned. "Hey, bud! You finally came out to join us!"

Keith couldn't help but grin. "I'm slowly getting there. I've never really done this before."

"It takes a lot of practice," Shiro said, and then proceeded to skate forwards and backwards and ran circles around him.

"Show-off!" Keith said with a laugh.

Keith saw Hunk and Pidge on the other end, so he began making his way towards them. He was still a bit unsteady and rather wobbly. He jerked to the side when he felt like he was going to crash, but he righted himself before that could happen. It did, however, startle him and caused his pulse to climb.

He heard someone yell his name, which took him out of his thoughts. His eyes went from his feet to the crowd skating far away from him. He saw Hunk wave at him and then called his name again. "Keith!"

"Hey, Hunk!" Keith waved. Once he made it to Hunk and Pidge, it felt like a huge accomplishment. He had just skated the whole length of the rink without needing to grab onto the bar.

From then on, he spent the next hour with his friends, laughing and skating. It was pretty chilly outside, and he was glad for the gloves he had on. His nose was freezing and it wouldn't stop running.

Besides the cold weather, things were looking up. He was having a lot of fun, and it sure beat spending time in his apartment studying the night away.

As Keith was skating alongside Pidge, he saw a girl headed right towards him. Because Keith was new at this, he didn't have time to turn his body and maneuver himself away, and the girl wasn't doing anything to change directions herself. He also had no idea how to stop. He normally just let himself slow down naturally.

There was nothing else to do except, well. . .

CRASH!

Keith and the girl collided, sending them sprawling on the ice. Keith went down hard, feeling his knee hit the ice first with a painful bang. _That's gonna bruise_ , was the thought that crossed Keith's mind.

He heard Pidge and Hunk shout his name and then he felt shadows surrounding him. He opened his eyes to all his friends looking at him worriedly.

"Keith, are you okay?" Pidge asked.

"I, I think so," Keith said. He started to get up and then felt a sharp pain in his ankle. He moaned. "Ow, wait, I don't know. My ankle doesn't feel right."

Keith noticed all eyes had suddenly turned from him. He looked to the side to see who everyone was looking at. It was the guy who gave them the tickets. Great. And here Keith was, on the ground, looking pathetic. Way to make a second impression.

"Is everything okay? I saw everyone gather around so I came to see-"he started, and then he finally saw Keith on the ice, laying on his side. "Oh, what happened? Are you okay?"

"I fell," Keith said, trying to keep the wince off his face but failing.

Arms encircled him as he was carefully lifted from the ice. He kept his left foot elevated as Shiro put an arm around his waist and they headed towards the bench outside the skating rink. Keith wondered what happened to the girl that had hit him, but he figured she was probably okay since he never saw her again.

Shiro knelt down at Keith's feet and undid his laces and loosened the skate as well as he could. "Think you can get your foot out?"

Keith moved his foot up, but yelped as it pulled on his injured ankle.

"I know it hurts, Keith, but you gotta keep trying," Shiro prompted.

Shiro held back the shoe's tongue and laces even harder as Keith maneuvered his foot out slowly and painfully. With a cringe of pain, he finally got his foot out successfully.

Shiro inspected his foot and had him rotate it while all his friends looked on, including Lance.

"How bad does it hurt?" Shiro asked, lowering his foot to the ground.

"It's okay. I'm sure it's fine," Keith said.

"Well, can you walk on it?" Shiro looked at him unsurely.

"Well, I mean, no, but—"

"Keith," Shiro interrupted. "What do you want to do? Should we take you to the doctor?"

"It's okay, Shiro," Keith said. "I'm sure it's just a sprain. Don't worry about me. You guys go out and keep skating."

Despite his friends' protests, Keith stuck to his decision. It wasn't a life or death situation, his ankle could wait, and if it got any worse, then he could worry, but for now, his friends were having a great time until his accident, and he didn't want to be the one to spoil it for them.

He watched them skate away hesitatingly, but once they got back on the ice, he heard them laughing again, which made him feel a little better. The coldness, however, was starting to get to him, and he could feel it from the bench seeping through his jeans. He shivered.

"Hey, I'm sorry you got hurt out there," the guy from the ticket booth said. Lance. Keith had almost forgotten about him.

Keith's stomach did a somersault as he looked up at Lance, whose eyes were oozing concern for him. It was attractive. Keith felt his face heat up. "Yeah, well, it is what it is I guess." Keith gestured to his ankle, which was protected only with a white sock.

"You look cold. You can hang with me in my ticket booth if you like?" Lance asked, tilting his head a bit as he waited for a response.

Keith smiled.

"It's a little warmer in there, and besides, I could use some company myself."

Warmth sounded very good right now. He knew the skating rink had another 30 minutes before closing, and he really didn't want to be sitting on this freezing bench the whole time. "Sure. I'll take you up on that."

Keith stood and put weight on his hurt ankle and the pain almost had him collapsing to the ground. He would have, actually, if it weren't for Lance's fast actions. Lance's eyes grew big as he saw Keith struggle to walk and was quickly at his side, acting as a crutch.

"You alright?" Lance asked, his arm around Keith's back.

"I'm fine," Keith said, struggling to swallow the whimpers of pain each time his foot touched the ground.

Lance held the door to the booth open and helped Keith get settled onto a stool. It was considerably warmer inside, and there was a small space heater in the middle of the wooden room.

"This is my little home away from home," Lance said. He got up when he had two more customers, and then turned his attention back to Keith.

"So, are you a college student, too?" Keith asked.

"Yeah, third semester," Lance said.

Keith's smile turned to a frown. The pain in his ankle was only growing worse, and now he felt an ache in his knee, too, that hadn't presented itself until now.

"Are you okay?" Lance asked.

"Yeah."

"It's your ankle, isn't it?" Lance pried. "You don't have to be embarrassed. I know the feeling. I broke mine when I first went ice skating. It was quite the adventure."

Keith gave a polite laugh, but in fact, he was hurting pretty terribly at this point, but he still didn't want to say anything. He looked at his watch. Only 15 minutes left until closing time.

"Hey, I'll be right back, okay? Don't go anywhere."

As if Keith could go anywhere. He waited five minutes and then Lance came back with two steaming cups in his hands. "Got us some hot chocolate from the booth next door. Here you go."

Keith thanked him and accepted it graciously. How nice of Lance to do that for him. As they sat and enjoyed their beverage, Keith saw his friends coming up to the booth to return their skates.

Keith stood on his good leg and waved at them. "Hey, guys!"

"Keith, what are you doing in there?" Hunk asked.

Lance answered for him. "I invited him in. He looked too cold outside and lonely."

Keith's friends gave him a little knowing look but kept their realizations to themselves, smiles creeping on their faces.

"Ready to go, Keith?" Shiro asked.

"Yeah, but, um, do you mind if you take me to the hospital instead?" Keith asked, even though it tore his dignity in two just by asking. It left him feeling needy and dependent, both things he despised.

Shiro's face scrunched up in confusion and shock. "You must be feeling really bad to be asking that. I'll go start up the car and drive it closer."

A few minutes later, Shiro returned, but not with the car. "Guys, the car won't start. I called a tow truck and they said it will take at least an hour to get here."

"Well, what are we supposed to do? No one else has a car and it's freezing out here," Pidge commented, shaking from the cold.

After a moment of silence, Lance piped up. "I could take him to the hospital if you want me to, Keith?"

Keith was surprised by Lance's offer, but he barely knew him. A part of him screamed yes, go with the hot guy who turns your insides into jelly, but the other part said but you don't even know him and you don't want to become a burden.

"I don't know, Lance. I don't want to inconvenience you," Keith said.

"It's not. I don't mind helping." Lance sniffed and pulled up his hood against the biting wind.

Keith glanced at his friends for any sign as to what they thought he should do. He could tell they were thinking it over. He had only known Lance for less than an hour, but Keith couldn't deny that Lance had been nothing but accommodating towards him. Heck, he served him hot chocolate and ten minutes after downing it, he was still alive and breathing.

The pain in his knee and ankle practically had him in tears, or was it from the chilly wind biting at his face? He had to admit he didn't want to spend the next hour out in the cold, shivering and in pain.

"Well, if you really don't mind, I'd like you to take me." Keith gave Lance a thankful smile and Lance gave him one in return.

"Okay then. Ready to go?"

The ride to the hospital was uncomfortably silent. Keith didn't know what to say. What do you talk about with someone you don't even know? As he struggled for some kind of conversational topic, Lance broke the silence.

"How's your ankle?" Lance asked, keeping his eyes on the road.

"Ugh," Keith groaned. It had been doing nothing but throbbing since he got in the car.

"That bad, huh?" Lance glanced at Keith long enough to see the wince on his face. "How'd it happen anyway?"

Keith explained how a girl had run into him while he was skating across the rink to his friends. It had been nothing but an unfortunate accident.

"Oof," Lance responded when Keith got to the part about the crash. "That's gotta hurt."

"Wouldn't have happened if I knew how to slow down." Keith laughed, but instantly regretted having shared that bit of information.

"That can take practice. I can show you sometime, you know. If you want," Lance added with a shrug of the shoulders.

Keith grinned to himself. "You're a skater?"

"Yeah. I get to skate free. Comes with the job." He pulled into the hospital parking lot. After parking the car, he turned to Keith, who was busy finding the door handle to get himself out. "Wait. Hang on. I'll come get you."

Lance then got out of the car and walked around to Keith's side and opened the door. Keith took Lance's outstretched hand let him pull him out of the car. On the way out, Keith's injured knee bumped the car door and he couldn't help but scream in pain.

He wished he could've kept it together for Lance's sake, because now he felt he had Lance worried.

"I'm so sorry!" Lance cried. "You okay, bro?"

Keith nodded vigorously to show him it wasn't his fault and that he was ok. Lance put his arm around him, and together they walked to the Emergency Room doors. The pain in Keith's ankle only intensified with each painful step, regardless of Lance helping him, but he knew it would've been much worse without his help. His knee was also aching even more, thanks to the car door mishap.

Almost there. Just a little more to go.

Keith had to admit he secretly liked the proximity between himself and Lance. He was so close that he could smell his cologne, or maybe it was the soap he used. Either way, Lance smelled amazing. As slender as he was, Lance had muscles. Keith could feel them by the way Lance gripped him closely to his side. Lance was strong and capable, and he liked that about him.

By the time Lance placed Keith in a seat in the waiting room, Keith was out of breath. Lance went to the front desk and brought him back some paperwork. After a small wait, Keith was called back by a nurse. Lance arose first and stuck out a hand to Keith. Keith grabbed it and Lance hoisted him up and held him closely again as they limped to the exam room the nurse guided them to.

The nurse took Keith's vitals and asked how he had gotten hurt, and then said the doctor would see him shortly. In Keith's mind, "shortly" doesn't mean 35 minutes, but apparently, that's what it means in the ER.

"I'm sorry this is taking so long," Keith told Lance. "I didn't mean to ruin your evening." Keith sat on the exam table on the crinkly white paper while Lance sat on a chair next to him.

"Hey, I volunteered. It's not a problem. I had nothing better to do anyway."

The doctor knocked and finally entered the room. He was friendly enough. He checked his ankle and had him push back his jeans so he could see his knee, and it was very purple and covered in bruises. The doctor had him go back for x-rays of both his knee and ankle, and then they sat in the room again for the results.

This time, the waiting was shorter. The doctor came back in and said Keith had a slightly fractured ankle and a badly bruised knee. He began putting a cast on his ankle while Lance asked the doctor all kinds of questions, like:

"Can the cast get wet? What happens if it gets wet?" (No. It will get moldy and smelly and he'll need a new one, said the doctor)

"How long does he have to wear it for?" (six weeks)

"How do you wrap it so fast?" (I've been doing this for 25 years)

The doctor gave him a prescription for pain pills and they were free to go. Lance picked up his medicine in the drive through before taking Keith home.

"Nice apartments," Lance said as he pulled up.

"Where do you live?" Keith asked.

"It's on the other side of campus. I'll have to show you sometime."

"Maybe when you show me how to ice skate?" Keith held his breath as he waited for his response.

"Yeah, definitely."

Keith showed him which apartment number he lived in and Lance stood by his side as Keith used his new crutches to get himself around. They were strange to use and didn't compare with the support and body heat that Lance had provided him, but they'd have to do.

Keith stopped in front of his door.

"Think you've got it from here?" Lance asked.

"Yeah, I think so. Thanks again, Lance, for everything."

"You're welcome. Hey, I know you're out of commission for a while until your ankle heals, so you wanna grab a bite to eat next week?"

"Yeah, I'd like that," Keith said with a grin.

They exchanged numbers and Keith closed the door with the biggest grin on his face. He couldn't wait to tell his friends.

 **Thanks for reading! Comments are greatly appreciated!** **Hope you enjoyed it.**


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